Karachi consulate shooting kills 2

The U.S. Consulate has been the target of several recent attacks.

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KARACHI, Pakistan (CNN) --Two police officers have been killed and six others, including one civilian, have been injured after gunmen opened fire outside the U.S. Consulate in the Pakistani city of Karachi.

None of the staff inside the compound at the time were injured in the attack, an interior ministry official told CNN.

Police say they have detained one of the suspected gunmen immediately after the shooting, but it is unclear exactly how many people participated in the attack.

There has been no word as to the origins of the gunmen or what might have sparked the attack.

The attackers concentrated their fire on the consulate's security checkpoints, the head of the Interior Ministry's crisis management center, Brigadier Javed Iqbal Cheema said.

He said the suspect being held by police was riding on a motorbike when he opened fire on the Consulate's exterior wall, targeting two security posts at the corners of the compound.

Paramilitary troops who arrested him found he was carrying two pistols and several rounds of ammunition, Cheema said.

The U.S. Consulate in the city was temporarily closed last year following a June 14 bomb attack just outside its grounds that killed 12 Pakistanis and seriously wounded more than a dozen others.

In response to that attack and a series of other terrorist-related violence, the consulate was relocated into another building in the same consulate compound.

Security has been tightened at U.S. diplomatic missions around the world amid escalating tensions over a possible war with Iraq and intelligence alerts from Washington warning of terrorist attacks.